Wednesday, February 06, 2008

Lost, on Ash Wednesday

There was a lot to pack in today, starting with an ashing ceremony for children at Tredegarville school. I must have 'ashed' about 150 people. I decided to interpret the sign of ashes as one of lostness, and started from the week long dissapearance last Autumn of Father Roy's dog Thomas, familiar to the children, and everyone else who lives in Adamsdown. I was leased wiht how it worked and developed that into a grown-up sermon for the noon and Evening Eucharists of the day. There was no time to write it down, but somehow it developed in the telling in a way that gave me pleasure to relate.

Chris Seaton was with me for the morning. It was good to share two services with him. I wasn't looking forward to performing on my own something I've so often been able to share with other clergy. I'm pleased that he's preaching on Sunday too. I feel as If I could do with a break.

Just as I was leaving for the noon Eucharist, Ben Glaze rang me for an interview, expressing enough interest in the Lenten podcast story to want a fresh picture of me to publish. The photographer turned up at the end of the Eucharist, and we had an amusing twenty minutes clowning about getting something he was happy to offer up for print - all in a day's work. The only bad publicity is no publicity, I tell myself - preahc the Word in season and out of season. I'm not sure how St Paul would take to this.

Then ,I had a quick errand to deliver mail to the City Centre Manager's office, and at that point I got distracted, and completely forgot to go to City Church for David Lee's lecture, which I'd been looking forward to. I went home and continued editing sound files, as the pod-cast preparation was only half complete. My efficiency seemed to drop somewhat and I only managed to get one more done and uploaded during the afternoon. Then I had to go out and take Holy Communion to two housebound people, and offer them a copy of the Lenten addresses, before it was time to go down to church and celebrate the third service of the day. After a late supper, another couple of hours of editing and another file was uploaded before bed. Nearly there!

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